


et ignis noster iterum fiet

by Moami



Category: Haikyuu!!
Genre: A World where Technology Rules and Magic is Being Prosecuted, Alternate Universe - Fantasy, Blood, Budding Love, Childhood Friends, Dragons, Fantasy, Gen, Haikyuu Ghibli Zine, Hajime is a dragon, Illegal Magic, Inspired by Studio Ghibli, Inspired by Tales from Earthsea, M/M, Magic, Tooru is a cheeky warlock in need of help
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2017-05-18
Updated: 2017-05-18
Packaged: 2018-11-02 00:49:28
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 3,601
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/10933515
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Moami/pseuds/Moami
Summary: The shadow isn’t a shadow anymore when Hajime is up on his feet tearing apart the chains. His mysterious saviour has lost the coat and stands with magic embracing them in sky blue and ocean green, and no, it can’t be, Hajime knows the colours of those destruction spells by heart,this is absolutely impossible-“Better late than never, isn’t it, Hajime?”





	et ignis noster iterum fiet

**Author's Note:**

> There was supposed to be a Haikyuu Ghibli zine at some point, but there were difficulties and so I decided to post my work here. The word limit was 3500 (which I exceeded) and that explains why this is kind of just a glimpse of a bigger story in a much larger fictional universe. Anyhow. I collaborated with [the absolutely lovely Hachi](http://hachidraws.tumblr.com/) and together we worked out a story that is influenced a little bit by all the Ghibli movies but mostly by Tales from Earthsea. Make sure to take a look at their artwork of which I'll add the link here later, and check all of their other art as well because it's (if I may say so) bloody fantastic.
> 
> Enjoy.
> 
> EDIT: A comment pointed out that I forgot the translation of the Latin title. Oops. It means "and our fire will be made/become again".

To be born as a dragon comes with only one rule: Trust nobody, and you may live.

 

It’s not really a surprise that Hajime is still alive even five years after humanity decided that technology is the greatest good and magic should be forbidden as well as preferably eradicated down to the very last creature. So tough situation, but he’s been the smarter one until now.

 

The guards did almost catch him thrice since the town gates were sealed. Almost. He still had time between chases to search for a way across the walls and towards the forest, all while hiding under spells older than the technology that now rules people’s lives. Another day or two, and his fire would’ve been strong enough for a transformation. He’s conserved energy, magic, heat. Hell, maybe he even would’ve tried tonight. Just blast a hurricane of fire against the inner wall where it’s weakest. Fight tooth and nail.

 

So Hajime refuses to trust anyone. But when the guards hold him to the ground and are about to drive too many spears between more of his ribs than even a dragon would survive, a shadow falls from the sky and bursts his oath into pieces.

 

“That dragon is _mine_ , you brassheads!”

 

The guards beep in confusion, lifting their ugly heads, tiny golden eyes reflecting moonlight. And even though they’re the most advanced robots humanity has come up with since the Second Industrial Revolution and the First Bill of Clearance of Magical Deviants, they stand no chance when the shadow bolts into motion.

 

Don’t let it be said that Hajime Iwaizumi doesn’t recognise a chance when he sees it.

 

Three guards go down with one swoop of the shadow’s coat. The material detaches from the figure’s body, tearing itself into tiny shreds, each exploding into a bilious green cloud of acid where it touches their armour.

 

Alright, he can work with that. Hajime bares his teeth into a grin and nudges one of the guards. “Hey there, metal bucket. Look me in the face when you’re filleting me.”

 

“Destroy deviants,” says the guard or tries to because its last word drowns in an avalanche of dragon fire.

 

The shadow isn’t a shadow anymore when Hajime is up on his feet tearing apart the chains. His mysterious saviour has lost the coat and stands with magic embracing them in sky blue and ocean green, and no, it can’t be, Hajime knows the colours of those destruction spells by heart, _this is absolutely impossible_ -

 

“Better late than never, isn’t it, Hajime?” Tooru Oikawa smiles at him through a haze of brick dust and flying sparks, one feet on a shattered guard and a purple protection glamour dissolving from his aura to make room for a vibrant blue-green that has not taken a chink of damage from dragon breath.

 

A moment of stillness ticks by in which Tooru rubs some dirt off his face, smearing blood from a gash on his cheek, and winks at Hajime with the same dark eyes from five years ago. An alarm siren howls. Then, chaos breaks out.

 

“I’m going to,” Hajime roars over the sound of his chest swelling with fire, “goddamn,” scales sprout from his skin, his hair rises as heat pivots into a storm around him, “kill you!”

 

The walls around him tremble. They’re awfully close to the town’s gate, and Hajime knows the weak spots in its architecture by heart after all those attempts of finding a way out. Tooru seems to sense that he’s about to break them out of here, and moves faster than lightning, vanishing to somewhere Hajime can’t see.

 

 _Alive,_ he thinks as the dragon fire fills his lungs and pushes towards his lips. _He’s alive, and he has his magic._

 

The city wall shatters into an inferno.

 

“How the hell are you _here_?” Hajime coughs out a lungful of dust and flicks his claws out, slashing through the head of another guard. Something touches his back and he growls, tensing up, but it’s Tooru’s scent that fills his nose.

 

“Need some dragon power for my plan,” Tooru yells over the uniform boom of metal feet stomping closer, and by the magic, those have to be hundreds.

 

Hajime grits his teeth together. He spits out a flame that melts the slain guards into a sea of molten copper. Then he’s stumbling, reaching for sharp pieces of brick to pull himself up what used to be the town’s wall. Tooru’s magic glows in the dark beyond the town, and when Hajime catches up to him running like the wind, they’re almost at the Lost Forest.

 

“And you thought I was the best man for that? I haven’t seen you in _five years_!” The cold night air howls against his skin, but Hajime runs as fast as he can, lets his fire simmer down.

 

Tooru throws him another wide grin. “Of course you are! And what are five years when you’ve been best friends for seventeen. I told you I’d find you.”

 

Hajime curses filthily and watches Tooru throw his head back in a laugh. Yeah, they’d promised that. _I’ll find you, always_ , their last words. “I’ll thank you later, if you don’t mind, when we’re not being hunted to _death_!”

 

An arrow hits the tree next to him. Another follows, hits its aim. Tooru screams, horrible in the night, and falls. Hajime whips around mid-run, falls with him. He may be a bit rusty but he still remembers how to carry Tooru so that he can keep firing magic at anyone behind them. More blood on Tooru. Not good. He cradles him against his chest, the forest blurring into black and night-green. “We can’t kill all of them!”

 

“There’s gotta be a place to hide - take that, you bastard!” Tooru’s fingers are spikes in the air, drawing patterns infinitely quickly. Guards explode into dust, but more follow. Too many.

 

Somewhere to hide, anywhere, as long as it makes them invisible. As long as it keeps Tooru alive because who cares if Hajime makes it now? They skid past a group of trees, tall and mighty, Hajime slipping on a patch of dew-dampened moss, and a weak pulse touches his heart. _Hither,_ something whispers. _Flee hither._

 

Firethorn. Hajime wants to cry from relief. The trees aren’t a group at all but a single giant plant, and its roots lift with a groan to reveal a pitch-black hole underneath. “Firethorn!” is all he has to yell and Tooru twists in his arms, eyes shining with unspoken spells. “The tree that hides all mag-”

 

“Watch your head!”

 

They plunge into darkness. The tree grunts, a long and deep sound, settling earth and roots over their heads. Outside, hundreds of metal feet thunder across the forest’s lost ground.

 

“It’s dark.” Tooru’s voice is barely a whisper, and only magic can make them hear each other like that, in silence and without a spoken sound traveling the air. He wishes they had more time. Time, a safe place, something to eat and just a damn moment to take a breath and hear each other’s stories.

 

He fumbles to his left, clutches Tooru’s hand. It trembles against his own. “We have to get deeper inside. They could see us like this, we’re too near the entrance. Come on.”

 

Tooru makes an impossibly tiny sound. “No. Can’t.”

 

“We have to, come on.” Hajime pushes him, tries to somehow turn his body into a shield because if they find them and open fire, maybe he can at least save one of them. They can’t even stand up, the cave barely lets them crawl, dry earth sneaking into their clothes and only letting a strip of sunlight in.

 

“But you know that I - don’t you remember that - “

 

“Not so loud, idiot. They’ll hear.”

 

“Hajime, I can still fight, I promise. We can take them on together.“

 

“Shh. I think they’re coming.“

 

Something rustles outside the cave. A terrible noise rises deep in Tooru’s throat, and Hajime doesn’t - _can't_ \- think anymore. He grabs Tooru by the neck, pushing a hand over his mouth to force it shut, and stumble-slides both of them deeper into the cave. His skin burns where Tooru’s lips move against it in a muffled scream. “Quiet,” Hajime whispers desperately.

 

The rustling grows louder. A metallic clang echoes down into the cave, earth crumbling from the entrance. Tooru yelps. They’ll be found, and he can’t risk that. Hajime hates himself for it, but he squeezes Tooru’s mouth, holds it shut. Fingers grab his wrist, hard, Tooru wheezing under his touch, teeth grazing Hajime’s flesh.

 

A guard shouts outside. Hundreds of metallic voices reply from all over the forest.

 

Hajime tries to press them even flatter into the dirt, but Tooru slaps his hand away and lunges against him in a single fluid motion. His hands are icy where they clench into the cloth over Hajime’s chest, nails digging in. He’s shivering. “Bear with it, you have to. It’s alright. Shh.” Magic whispers, constant and desperate. His hand has slipped off Tooru’s mouth, cradling his head so he doesn’t hurt himself. They’re deep underground now, and even to Hajime’s dragon heart that searches for caves as a home, it feels like a soon-to-be grave.

 

When the earth has stilled and the voices outside start to die, Hajime feels Tooru’s lips trembling against his neck. “ _Dark_.” No sound comes out, but Hajime still understands the word when magic that stinks of fear and burnt hair carries the meaning to him.

 

It takes a few seconds for Hajime to remember. He never forgot their childhood days, the first flares of magic (Tooru’s in the heat of June when the days were longest, his own in winter when the snow was so thick that its frost woke the fire inside him), the first touch of his growing claws against unafraid human hands. He could be a beast now if Tooru hadn’t been. That stupid boy, that brave boy who only looked at him with a huff, picked up another herb for his newest insane concoction, and declared that no, he couldn’t be scared of Hajime if he tried, they were friends after all. Best friends, and could Hajime stay tonight because the sun was setting earlier now? Because the dark only comes for lonely boys, not for dragon boys.

 

So stay tonight, Hajime. The dark is coming. Will you stay? “I can’t hear them anymore, can you? Hajime.”

 

He blinks, his mind going back into focus. Tooru is still in his arms. The cave is impossibly dark except for a ray of light that doesn’t reach where they lie. Dark.

 

“I think they’re gone.”

 

“I forgot.” It feels like the blood is being ripped out of his veins. “God, I’m sorry.”

 

“We have to go.” Tooru pushes himself forward on his stomach. After a bit of shuffling, he’s up on his knees, blocking out the light with his head. “Take my ankle, don’t let go. There’s no time and they may come back.”

 

“I didn’t - “

 

“I said _hold on now_.” A clump of earth hits Hajime’s face. He wipes it off but more follows and Hajime takes that as a sign to shut up and work. Tooru’s feet slam against his chest, flailing for a moment. “Wait. Here now, let me.” His fingers curl around thin ankles, steadying Tooru on his way up. While they crawl out of the hole - and now Hajime realizes how much it’s not a cave with safe walls of stone but a dirty prison under a dying tree - Tooru doesn’t say another word. His muscles strain in Hajime’s grip. He didn’t use to be that thin, but then again it’s been five years. The thought lets Hajime bites on the inside of his cheek hard enough to give them a final push out of this godforsaken dirty mess.

 

Tooru is already up on his feet when Hajime falls into the grass face-first. The earth is wet and what he thought to be a sliver of afternoon sunlight flooding the cave is barely reaching through the forest’s crowns high above his head now. Dawn is rising, and they still haven’t found a place to sleep or anywhere to go. His entire body aches.

 

Tooru isn’t looking at him. He’s brushing earth off his simple shirt and trousers, adjusting the dark green suspenders that could almost look like Hajime’s scales protectively curling over his chest, and stands upright. “I know how to get away from here. If I can find one of the ancient trails, it’ll lead us right to the center of the forest. There’ll only be ruins now, but my teacher told me that a witch of older times used to have a house there. It should have a library.”

 

Hajime frowns. “And what’s that supposed to do? Do you wanna research or steal old books? They’ll still be hunting us. We have to run.” His blood is boiling again, fire rising rapidly. “How can you think of books now when we almost died back then!” Both of them. Tooru, saving him from the guards. Hajime grits his teeth, barely swallowing a flame that tickles like wildfire in his throat.

 

Tooru just lifts a brow. His glare is fixed somewhere at Hajime’s feet, trailing over flowers and moss, strangely haunted. “Well that was rude. If you’d just listen - “

 

“I don’t want to die,” Hajime spits. “And I don’t want us to be separated again!” His fire curls and twists inside, making him wonder if burning down a few trees would help and disable the guards at the same time.

 

Tooru finally looks at him. The gash on his cheek has dried up, a trail of blood that ran down his jawline almost black. “Right, that’s enough.”

 

Hajime opens his mouth, but Tooru makes an elegant wave in his direction. The words fade in his chest. He chokes, tries to force them out, but Tooru stares him down until he lets it be. His eyes are alight with amber sparks, golden-brown flecks swirling. “So sorry to shut you up, but I have a plan and you _will_ listen to it, because this is what I’m brilliant at and you don’t have a clue what you’re talking about. We can’t run away forever.” Tooru begins to walk a slow circle, arms spread out almost gently as his fingers weave spells through the air.

 

The scent of magic fills Hajime’s nose. He swallows. Tooru moves with a grace he never acquired, and even though he’s different now - taller, hair that’s longer and darker, lost softness in his face and gained sharp strength everywhere else - he’s still the boy that didn’t know how to fear a dragon. Now there’s fear following Tooru’s motions though, which is entirely his fault. Hajime forces himself to take a deep breath. The spell on his mouth loosens. “Fine,” he says, takes a step forward. “What I did there… I really am sorry.”

 

Tooru is circling a smaller spot now, fingers of one hand pointing to the sky while he gently motions around a white flower with the other. “No, _I’m_ sorry,” he says softly, going to his knees to touch his thumb to one of the petals. “You probably forgot about it, but I’m not too excited about dark places underground.”

 

They had been children, back then. “I didn’t. I didn’t forget.” Magic is a curse, Tooru’s father had screamed, foam at his mouth as white as the eyes rolling back into his skull. Bury it, bury him, bury the pest in my son’s body, I did it for the village, for all of you.

 

“Oh.” Tooru stands, the petal between two fingers. He nudges a curl of hair behind his ear, eyes on the ground. “I see.” His lashes are darker, too, Hajime thinks. He’s older. Five years are a long time. But here they are again, in the Lost Forest, and he doesn’t have to dig Tooru out of a grave that his father put him into anymore, doesn’t have to push away earth to find his sobbing friend underneath.

 

“I’m sorry for scaring you, but not for dragging you down there.”

 

Tooru huffs a laugh that sounds bitter. “Of course not. That’s, that’s typical. By the magic, you’re an idiot.”

 

“I really am, hm?”

 

“The worst. A horrible monster, all fire and no sensitivity.”

 

Hajime is by his side with a few steps, touching his palms that are too rough for skin so soft against Tooru’s jaw. Before he nudges their foreheads together, before magic pulses through the contact like ancient bonds never broken, Tooru hiccups another laugh, another, until the tears are falling and Hajime grips him so tightly that it hurts.

 

“I’d just rather have you scared than dead. Go hate me for it, but don’t leave. Don’t leave, Tooru, because we’re so strong together and magic shall help me if I let anyone get between us again. And now I’ll risk being turned into a snail or whatever disgusting creature you hexed at me when we were children, but I’m not going to let go of you before you explain your plan. We’ll find a way. We will, you hear me? I won’t see you dead.”

 

He watches Tooru swallow, his throat working hard. It’s a good thing that the guards are gone, for the magic that sings between them has the grass swirl in circles, leaves rising in invisible air streams, petals tucking themselves into Tooru’s hair and tickling Hajime’s neck. It’s no wonder, Hajime thinks, and shivers when the tips of their noses brush. If I would do anything for him, why wouldn’t all magic bow just to be his?

 

It feels like years before Tooru exhales. He moves, slow, never shy. His hands slide down Hajime’s shoulders, nudging his left and Hajime’s right fingers together. When he looks up, dark green spots dance over his cheek, and a faint glow illuminates a path that vanishes into the forest before them.

 

“So we’re even now. I saved you, you saved and scared me. It’s a nice game, but I think we should get going. There’s a portal in the library that opens at sunrise, and nature doesn’t wait, not even for a dragon.”

 

Hajime doesn’t have to think. Not about what kind of portal, or where it leads. He squeezes Tooru’s hand and lets the scales crawl up his face until they frame his jaw, slithering to his shoulders. Magic heats the air around him. “Lead the way. I’ll watch our backs.”

 

* * *

 

The ruins aren’t what Hajime expected. There’s not much of a library left except tall white columns resting on a wide platform of tiles. They form a large square, reaching up into the width of the sky, and for a second Hajime fears that they’ve found the wrong spot. Did the forest misguide them?

 

“Here,” Tooru says somewhere behind him. Hajime turns and finds him on the ground, gently touching to a tile right in front of a column. “See? I knew it. We’re here.” His voice is heavy with tears, and Hajime feels terrible for watching him cry twice in a day, so he hurries over.

 

There really is a tiny rune carved into the stone, barely larger than the nail of his little finger. “You were right.” He doesn’t even ask, simply pulls Tooru into his arms and lets them both tumble to the hard floor.

 

“We’ll be alright.” He doesn’t know why he’s saying it, because so much could still go wrong. But Tooru blinks at him in the first sunlight of the new day, and Hajime dares to brush his fingers through the hair of the boy to whom he’s not a monster. “I promise.”

 

Tooru smiles. “I’ll hold you to that.”

 

The sun breaks over the horizon, and an arrow plunges into Tooru’s arm.

 

If his fire was a flame before, it’s a storm now. Hajime jolts to his feet, aura burning in the golden of liquid iron, and the first row of guards doesn’t stand a chance. They’re not copper but silver, from the capital then and oh, that’s it, nowhere will ever be safe for them. Tooru is bleeding behind him, but he’s braver than anyone and just grabs his arm, mumbling an angry spell that sends a wave of energy into the second row of metal before them.

 

Hajime feels the scales crawl up his ears already, the prickle of wings that almost rip his skin, and just when the transformation threatens to tear out his sanity, Tooru hollers:

 

“The portal!”

 

Sunlight floods the clearing. Guards fall, row by row, as a soft golden glow forms in the middle. It arches up to the highest column, slender and wide enough for the two of them, runes floating where the doorknob would be. Hajime stares for a moment, speechless, before a hand grabs his wrist and he takes Tooru’s arm over his shoulder to get him upright.

 

“It says,” Tooru coughs, blood dripping down his chin, “it says, _‘To a safe haven through an ocean of danger’._ Well that’s cheerful.”

 

Hajime chokes on a laugh. “It’s terrible. This portal is ancient. It’ll tear us apart.” He takes a step, still, Tooru leaning on him. Metal crushes under their feet. The glow reaches for them.

 

“Safe haven, Hajime.” Tooru’s eyes are closed. His face is bloodless, mouth barely moving, but the smile is there and his grip on Hajime’s shirt is wild and alive. “Let’s sail.”

 

Hajime looks at him, and smiles. His lips brush Tooru’s forehead. “Anywhere, if it’s with you.”

 

Together, they go.


End file.
